A bold prediction of a five-year window filled with unparalleled success for the Senators now officially fades into memory.
As a hopeful world began a brand new year last week, the Ottawa Senators’ projected period of “unparalleled success” quietly ended.
That sunny forecast came from a bygone Senators era, when the team had completely different ownership, management, and coaching. It painted a pretty picture for the years 2021-2025, a five-year window that closed last week without success or fanfare, and only one playoff appearance to show for it.
In Feb, 2019, the team issued a statement that confirmed owner Eugene Melnyk's confident remarks at a corporate event in Toronto. This is how it read:
Last night, Eugene Melnyk and the entire Senators hockey team and management hosted a thank-you event in Toronto for a group of close to 200 people, mainly the team’s corporate sponsors and partners. During Mr. Melnyk’s remarks, he thanked those in attendance and commented on the importance of the team’s partners, as well as talking about the history of the Ottawa Senators during his ownership and the team’s more than $105 million in contributions to the local community.
Mr. Melnyk also confirmed during the presentation that, on the hockey side of the business, expectations were that the Senators’ rebuilding plan would take another season or two from now. When his general manager (Pierre Dorion) confirms that the Senators have all the pieces of the foundation in place, he pledged to the guests in attendance that the Senators will be all-in again for a five-year run of unparalleled success, planning to spend close to the NHL salary cap every year from 2021 to 2025.
He reiterated that the Senators’ current rebuild is a blueprint on how to bring the Stanley Cup home to its rightful place in Ottawa.
Frankly, it wasn't long before Melnyk's vow began looking less like confidence and more like an attempt to soften the blow for what was just ahead. The rebuild hadn't really begun; they were still in teardown mode.
One month after Melnyk's comments, the club traded away their top three scorers, Mark Stone, Matt Duchene, and Ryan Dzingel. The club spent most of the next few years backfilling with a few too many ineffective veterans.
But despite going scorched earth on the remnants of the 2017 Eastern Finalist roster, there were more than a few signs that Melnyk was planning to honour the spending part of his vow, investing big money in players that Dorion said would be part of the club’s young core.
He was right on some of them.
Thomas Chabot signed a big, long-term contract that same summer. But so did Colin White.
The following year, on Dorion’s advice, Melnyk signed off on another big contract to newly acquired goaltender Matt Murray, a two-time Stanley Cup champion.
In 2021, Drake Batherson got a six-year contract at $4.9 million AAV. The following month, Brady Tkachuk got a seven-year deal at $8.2 million AAV.
Melnyk then passed away in March of 2022, barely into year two of the five-year run in question, so he never got a chance to deliver on his 2019 promise or complete his plan.
The club’s moments of big spending continued a few months after Melnyk’s passing. That summer, the Senators signed Claude Giroux to a three-year contract worth $19.5 million and acquired star forward Alex DeBrincat from the Chicago Blackhawks.
Also that year, they re-signed Josh Norris to an eight-year contract, Tim Stützle got an eight-year deal at $8.35 million, and Artem Zub signed a four-year deal.
We'll never know if Melnyk would have signed off on the deals of 2022, or anything else that might have pushed them toward the cap and success. But based on the investments in Chabot, White, Murray, Tkachuk, and Batherson, all of which happened on his watch, there's reason to believe he planned to keep his word.
What was always going to ruin Melnyk's plan, even if he'd lived to see it through, was the lack of investment in the rebuild's architecture, not to mention his overinvolvement in hockey operations and decisions. But even if he abruptly changed direction overnight, he'd already created a culture and reputation that the best hockey executives wanted no part of.
Regardless, the five-year run in question has now come and gone without the success Melnyk had hoped for, unparalleled or otherwise. From 2021-25, as Sens fans know all too well, there has been only one playoff appearance, and it lasted only six games.
Clearly, none of this falls on current ownership or management, which has been furiously working on this fixer-upper since the day they arrived.
No, seeing this chapter close is more for the fans. They spoke about the promise for years, first with disbelief, then with sarcasm, and now it just feels like the credits are finally rolling on a bad movie. Despite its fractured relationship with the former owner, this is a fan base that desperately wanted his 'unparalleled success' prediction to be right.
But maybe it's not totally wrong. Maybe, like a lot of things in Ottawa, it's just running a little late.
By Steve Warne
The Hockey News - Ottawa
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